Chris Abouzeid's Blog, page 47

Down The Rabbit Hole of Research

By Bethanne Patrick You probably know the feeling. You might be stuck on something in your manuscript, or you might be flying through a section, when you hit a place that needs…research. What do you do? If you’re like me and many other writers, you open up a new tab ...

Hearing Voices

  Guest Post by Jon Clinch John Hartford said it best a long time ago: “Style is based on limitation.” The beginning writer—if he’s earnest enough, and working to get a grip on his tools—will sometimes tell you that he’s found his voice, when what he’s really done is discover ...

A Tortured Writer

  By Nancy Bilyeau My friend Sandy Morgan is one of the people I test things out on. She’s a fanatical reader of mysteries and thrillers, from P.D. James to Anne Perry. So while visiting her, I showed her a draft of the jacket copy for my first novel, The ...

Desperately Seeking Anne Tyler: Starting a Novel and Looking for Inspiration

By Juliette Fay I’m about to start writing a new novel and I’m slightly terrified. What makes it so gut-twisting scary? I really have no idea. I’ve done it before and survived without any noticeable scars. In fact, once I’d started it was rather pleasant. I love spinning a story, ...

Friday Faves: Can You Direct Me to Privacy?

  By Kathy Crowley Maybe it’s the most recent round of privacy worries surrounding Facebook’s Graph Search, or maybe it’s that I have a five year old who has recently begun to invoke his right to privacy as though he were there on the day the Bill of Rights was ...

What does a novel’s interior design say about its characters?

By Nichole Bernier Do settings reflect the mood of a novel? Or do settings set the mood? I’m not being cute, in a chicken-and-egg sort of way. Clearly in some books the environment and dwellings play just a bit part, while in others they cast such a spell you couldn’t ...

May Contain Nuts or Nudity: Labeling for Book Covers

By Chris Abouzeid As a consumer, I’m always astounded by the ingredient labels on food packaging. No matter how much a company wants to sell their product, no matter how many catch-words they plaster across the front (“Natural!” “Healthy!” “High Fiber!” “Fat free!”), I can look at the ingredients label ...

Now Write and Never Look Back

Guest post by Josh Magill [photo by ErwanLB] I was a new college student at Southern Illinois University when I met author Benjamin Percy a little more than 12 years ago. At that time, he was a long side-burned, growly graduate student teaching my English 101 class. He had a ...

How (Not) To Become A Writer

By Laura Zigman People often ask writers how they became writers. It is a difficult question to answer because when you actually start to explain how you got to where you are, the person who asked you is already bored. This is because what they really want to know is ...

Friday Faves: The Human Condition Edition

By Robin Black There is always, inevitably, a lot of sadness in the world, and in recent weeks I have been witness to some staggering instances through friends (some of the “virtual” variety). My first two links here have to do with tragedies I have recently watched others go through. ...